Hellsing drabble - Not for Him

[lavivi]

Because I really, really, really need to post some kind of writing-thing.  And I actually showed this to a friend (not my beta) who responded very nicely. 

So, a drabble I just sort of jotted down one afternoon, although actually I did word it very carefully, trying to impart the exact meaning and feeling I wanted - *shrugs a little*  Don't know exactly how well it worked. 

I have another drabble too (that's fit for posting, anyway), and I'll probably put it up here too if I get some good any feedback to this.  HA, though that isn't likely.

So.

Title: Not for Him (OMEGA, a title)
Fandom: Hellsing
Word Count: 219
Betaed? No.
Summary:  A moment - not A Moment, mind you, but just a moment - between Walter and Integra.  No romance anywhere whatsoever, how original.  I'd like to let the reader choose her age - it's fairly obvious about how old she is.  There's a margin of a few years.

Not for Him

Walter waited silently by the door, watching as Integra stood before the full-length mirror.  She was staring into it as she adjusted her ascot and cross, her gloved fingers moving so slowly it almost appeared as though they were in a trance. 

“Walter,” she said, speaking very softly as her gaze never moved from the mirror, and he glanced at her face as he barely saw her lips move.  “What do you think my father would say, if he could see me now?” 

He opened his mouth to speak, then stopped; the honest answer that he believed was that it would be impossible for her father to recognize her.  But he couldn’t say that – what else could he say, that would somehow reassure her – perhaps that her father would be proud of her, ultimately (if he ever got his voice back), that she was serving Hellsing so well –

Integra moved her head very slightly to glance at him, her fingers still touching the perfectly straight tie, and she had never looked more emotionless. 

Then she dropped her hands and moved away from the mirror, passing through the door – saying almost idly as she did, though the detachment in her voice made the skin on the back of his neck prickle:

“That’s all right.  I’m not doing it for him anyway.”

Comments

[soharavsalienta.livejournal.com]

::sheds cat hair::

Oooh. I do like. I like the second half much better; it gives off an aura of feather-light touches and sharp, graceful movements and...yes, I do not know if this makes sense, but it read like a knife lightly cutting small, delicate nicks in something.

...Oh, God, the purple prose is threatening to attack. So sorry.

That said, "She was staring into it as her gloved fingers, moving so slowly it almost appeared as though they were in a trance, adjusted her ascot and cross" reads awkwardly, I think. By the time I get to what her fingers are doing, I forget that it is her fingers that are doing the adjusting. Maybe I just have a short attention span, but it was confusing for me the first time I read the sentence.

Congratulations on writing, and amidst scholarships, too. ;) You're doing so much better than I am.

[soharavsalienta.livejournal.com]

::adds cool writing icon::

[http://users.livejournal.com/_lavinia_/]

Hee.

Thank you for the marvelous, marvelous comment, dahling. I do like the first half of your comment, hee. It is very fitting for Integra.

And yes, I have re-arranged that sentence, and we have agreed that it is loads better.

OMEGA DO NOT MENTION SCHOLARSHIPS.

[mortal-maiden.livejournal.com]

Oooh. Me like. The only sentence that seems a bit awkward (to me) is this one: she said, speaking very softly as her gaze never moved from the mirror, and he glanced at her face as he barely saw her lips move. It just seems too long, or something... like it needs to be split where the comma is. Hmm.

Other than that, a very cool drabble. (Heh, almost literally, too - for the characterization of Integra. Wuahahaha.)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_lavinia_/]

Hee; thanks for commenting with feedback, LMI.

[givemethechild.livejournal.com]

Lovely! It's subtle and dark, and I love Walter's POV. His observations on Integra's drastic change are very IC. Beautifully done, and well concluded!

- And I didn't mention this before, but the fact that Integra even asked Walter what she thought her father would say is thought-provoking. It's clear that she still holds her father in very high regard... but we all knew that, yes?

[http://users.livejournal.com/_lavinia_/]

Ooh, I'm so glad you like this. Heh, your thoughts are some of the most important because you actually know Hellsing and whether thoughts/actions are IC or not.

...Well, I don't know - I mean, I think the last line rather negates that. But it's not like she totally despises or feels utter contempt for him - he was a very good director of Hellsing, provided a standard up to which she always feels she must live. So there's that, but the point of the drabble is also that he and his memory isn't the reason why she sacrifices everything and works herself to the bone, almost turning herself into a machine.

I think the reason why she asks Walter this in this scene is just that it happened to occur to her...it isn't something she thought of before, and now that it has occured to her she asks the one person who would really know. But, as she says, it doesn't really matter. It wouldn't change anything.

[givemethechild.livejournal.com]

Hee! My thoughts are important! ::is happy::

...but the point of the drabble is also that he and his memory isn't the reason why she sacrifices everything and works herself to the bone, almost turning herself into a machine.
Ooh, see, I got an entirely different impression from this drabble! - Well, not entirely different - but I got the impression that her father is definitely still a big factor in how she now lives and acts, and that her question - what her father would think of her - wasn't something that just occured to her, but something she continually asks herself, in the pursuit of living up to the standard she's turned him into. And the last line, which you say seems to negate the fact that she holds him in high regard, well - when I read it, I imagined that she was using that as a defense mechanism to prevent Walter from perceiving something she sees as a weakness. Because in her heart of hearts (as mum would say) she knows that the way she idolizes her father is, if not ridiculous, at least illogical. Therefore, she would rather Walter see her rigid self-control as something she does for her country alone instead of in the hopes that, were her father alive, it would make him proud.

However, even if her father didn't approve - as she says, it doesn't really matter. It wouldn't change anything. Which provides an interesting twist. She's doing this for the approval of her dead father, but even if Walter tells her that Arthur wouldn't be proud (hypothetically speaking, because we know he wouldn't put it so bluntly, even if he thought it was true) it wouldn't matter. It's a moot point - because there's no way she's going to stop being who she is. Kind of a paradox there, eh?
Understand, these are merely my own extrapolations on the text. Isn't it interesting, though, how you can write something with a particular idea in mind, and a reader can pick up on a mood or theme entirely different than what you intended to portray! Kind of like the story of Kurt Vonnegut taking a class on his own Slaughterhouse Five, and upon turning in an analysis of the book to the teacher (who didn't recognize him) she asked him imperiously whether he had even read the book.

[lavinialavender.livejournal.com]

Hm, that is interesting. Heh, I don’t really mind, I guess – that’s part of reading, to be able to see your own interpretation in it that makes you happy. Because I still have my own, too. We’re quite in agreement, though, in your second paragraph about how it’s irrelevant what her father would think of her now – as I said, she isn’t doing it for him. Her motivation is her duty to Hellsing…which is all of her ancestors, and her own name, and her mission from the queen (which is made up in the whole organization). How one Hellsing (i.e., her father or her Dear Uncle Richard) succeeds or fails…that’s inconsequential, really, to her and what she presently does. Richard technically was a Hellsing – but just because he proved to be an utter maggot, does not mean the Hellsing name is permanently tarnished. And if her father did somehow appear to her and was clearly utterly shocked by her – she would naturally be hurt, but she would push it away and go on exactly as she has been: doing her best, her hardest to maintain Hellsing and its reputation. Does that make sense at all?

Whoa, that’s a funny story with Kurt Vonnegut, though. (I love Cat’s Cradle – I made “Bokonism” an interest here on elljay. And I saw him recently, as a guest on Jon Stewart’s Daily Show.)

[bloodrebel333.livejournal.com]

I agree, it's like knives. Knives are so very, very cruel, you see - the way they create a border between two parts of a whole, how something that once didn't know better than to be connected now is not.

I like the second half more, because it's so chilled-cutting distant, as if there's a part inside her that's clawing at the glass and crying and begging and dying, and she's locking that part firmly away.

How she needs to disconnect, detach, to create a distance between herself and everything else to hold everything up. It's not that she's faking it; she's forcing herself not to make it real.

It's like the woman in my icon. All great models look like that - they look any way the photographer wants them to, but they're detached, and their eyes are dead.

[bloodrebel333.livejournal.com]

That is, I like it. It's a drabble you have to reread for full/further appreciation, though.

[lavinialavender.livejournal.com]

Thank you for replying. I think you did capture a lot of it. Particularly, "It's not that she's faking it; she's forcing herself not to make it real."